There is no way that Gatorade will help you lose weight. That's not it's purpose. It's purpose is to provide calories to someone that's working out hard and doesn't need to worry about weight gain or loss. Whether it's the best way to do that is open to debate.

If you want to lose weight (fat), then have coffee before your workout and have protein after. Whey protein is OK.

Actually stuward, that's not entirely accurate. The purpose of Gatorade is to provide rapid absorbtion of fluids and replace electrilytes. The sugar in Gatorade decreases the time it takes to absorb the fluid and thus it is more quickly absorbed that pure water. The electrolytes are there to replace the ones you lose during sweating.

Stu and Hoose--you're both partly right. Hoose, your explanation is the theory behind re-hydration drinks, but I believe that Gatorade has more sugar than necessary. I agree that it won't help lose weight, and in general could be a detriment. Peter did some extensive reading and research on this topic a couple of years ago. He stopped using Gatorade, and started using a custom-made drink that was (as I recall) based on Pedialyte, a re-hydration solution marketed for kids who have diarrhea. I think he was adding some flavoring and a few other things. I haven't heard him mention it for quite a while.

Stu and Hoose--you're both partly right. Hoose, your explanation is the theory behind re-hydration drinks, but I believe that Gatorade has more sugar than necessary. I agree that it won't help lose weight, and in general could be a detriment. Peter did some extensive reading and research on this topic a couple of years ago. He stopped using Gatorade, and started using a custom-made drink that was (as I recall) based on Pedialyte, a re-hydration solution marketed for kids who have diarrhea. I think he was adding some flavoring and a few other things. I haven't heard him mention it for quite a while.

Peter?

I agree. The only thing all that sugar is useful for is replacing glycogen in your muscles. If you start getting shaky in an intense marathon workout during an overtraining phase, it really does the trick.

So in other words advanced bodybuilding is the only real application for it.

I have actually heard of athletes using pedialyte before. supposedly it works very well.

He doesn't even mention teh electrolytes so the main benefit comes from the water and calories. His major beef with it is the lack of protein.

Here's his advice for Endomorphs:

Quote:

Second, if you’re an athlete who naturally has more of an endomorphic body type and tends to gain weight easily or tends to gain fat during competition periods (World Cups, etc) when eating a higher carbohydrate diet, you’ll want to half the recommendation above by ingesting 30g carbohydrate and 15g protein for every 2 hours of training. Therefore you’d be averaging 15g carbohydrate and 7.5g protein for every hour of training.

In addition to this, you’d add BCAA(branched chain amino acids) into your workout drink at a rate of 5g BCAA per hour of training. Therefore you’d end up with 15g carbohydrate, 7.5g protein, and 5g BCAA for every hour of training.

Note that these recomendations are to support performance, not to encourage fat loss. At the very least, if you're going to drink Gatorade, cut it in half with water and add a scoop of protein. You'll save money that way and still get a performance boost while minimizing fat gain.

have you guys seen that new cocunut water electrolyte drink? It has no added sugar (or so they say ) and it has loads of good carbs and potassium for your muscles. I think its called zyco or something, they sell it everywhere here now

have you guys seen that new cocunut water electrolyte drink? It has no added sugar (or so they say ) and it has loads of good carbs and potassium for your muscles. I think its called zyco or something, they sell it everywhere here now

I bet it still doesn't have protein in it.

Actually regular coconut water is full of electrolytes and very little sugar. You could use it for a base for a home made drink maybe adding dilute fruit juice and whey.

Edit:I just went to the Zico site and this is the first recipe they had:

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